We Really Had It Great With Voom!!

[Tvlman]

After searching for a movie in HD last night I realized (not for the first time) how great I a had it with VOOM. I have TWC which gives me Showtime, HBO and HDNET Movies. So after searching those three channels and coming up with "2 Days in The Valley" (or was it "3 Days in The Valley?") for the umpteenth time (a good movie by the way but you can only watch it so many times) I turned to DISH which now carries the tattered remnants of VOOM. (You might say VOOM on DISh is like what's now left of New Orleans compared to the old New Orleans.) On DISH I checked Guy, Majestic & Monsters but could not find an HD flick I wanted to watch. Just 6 HD channels to choose from. In the good old days of VOOM we had 10 VOOM movie channels (I guess 11 counting Monsters) and 10 Premium channels becasue we got both East & West feeds) 21 HD movie channels then......
6 now. Oh, well....just re-living the good ole days. Now where did I put my drink?

 

[lilyarbie]

Amen to that brother....

Voom was a great service and was never outdone on it's HD channel offerings during it's short life. It seems that now HD programming is rare these days and in too short supply. I miss all those HD offerings. The thing that really ticked me about Voom was all of those who complained about it to the very end. Now, where is all of those HD offerings. Well, you've got a little with this company over here and a little with that company over there. That basically amounts to didly squat. I can't believe the 30th of this month will mark 1/2 year since that company's demise.

 

[vurbano]

Amen. We really had it great.

 

[salsadancer7]

FiOS boyz....give it another 6 months.....from what I have see....I was in the Dallas-Forth Worth area and one of the folks I dealt with....who lived in Keller...invited us over for a nice family dinner....we happened to talk about VOOM...and he had FiOS and sait it had a BETTER picture than VOOM....I had to see to believe....and I did see....WOW

...less than a year boyz.....less than a year

 

[MarcelV]

FIOS will only be availeble in a few cities in the next 4 till 5 years. So, great if you live in one of those markets, but guess what, not everyone lives there.
And yes, miss my Voom!

 

[hdtvGeek]

Yes, Marcel Living in a Bellsouth area is the pits, to bad FIOS isn't an option in this area. Dish gives you < 1/2 the Voom for almost twice the price (plus all the home shopping channels you can puke at). DirecTv is a joke, I can pick up locals via OTA just fine, they need to use the bandwidth for more national HDTV. And let's not forget Insight, all the fuzzy analog you could want and little in the way of digital let alone HD content.

Man I'd like to kick everyone who complained about Voom, it was the BEST, good HD, good mix of SD at a very good price.

Still OTA only using the Voom Box.

 

[motorcycle_rider]

We did have it good with Voom. Voom also made this forum alot more interesting.... no offence Scott. What I mean by that between all the complaints you where always looking for Voom added such n such channel, Or new update released to recievers. I was always running from the pc to the tv to see if the updates where on my system. Almost had more fun with that then watching tv. Now that I am with Dish the updates, new channel offerings are not that great of a thrill. If Dish where to add HD channels at the rate Voom was expanding it would bring back the good old times of running from here to tv to see if I was seeing it also.

 

[fksammons]

VOOM never released their promised DVR. You may have had it great with VOOM but I didn't so please don't say "We".

 

[hdtvGeek]

fksammons,

I wouldn't want to include you in the WE. You are exactly the group of whiners that kept Voom from succeeding. I hope you love all the fuzzy SD that you can record on Dish/Direct/Cable. I bet you you record the home shopping channel Now we have very little HD available and you and your type are just loving it because you have a DVR and can record all the SD crap you want. Wow if you wanted to record SD you could have just hooked up a Media Center PC. Now you don't even have the choice. Its SD and over compressed HD lite for foreseeable future But wait E*,D* MIGHT just add another HD channel oh my it's the home shopping network Voom was it, but we couldn't wait for the DVR , but we have plenty of time to wait for the others to add HD

 

[lilyarbie]

Dvr??????

What good is an HD DVR if you don't have the programming for it? You may have an HD DVR with Dish or DirecTV, but you don't have the massive choices of HD programming like Voom offered. Programming versus DVR?? I go with programming. Who cares if I can record it in HD. I just want to watch something in HD period.

 

[mukaidaf]

i miss voom! My wife actually misses it too. she really enjoyed the Voom exclusives like Gallery. i haven't the heart to go back to cable (SD really sucks), and dish seems to be holding back on Voom. i check up on this forum to see if anyone has found something better, but nothing yet. maybe something will come about with the transition to MPEG4, right?

 

[Shawn95GT]

I also have fond memories of Voom.

Like some of the others here, a couple of my voom boxes are still 'in action' as OTA recievers.

Something I noticed post-Voom that I wish I'd have noticed before it went under was that the 4:3 squish picture is actually VERY usefull. I'm feeding this into the Tivo and having my TV stretch it back out.

HD DVR it's not, but the picture is WAY superior to anything I get with my digital cable.

I'm about 1/2 way into setitng up a 4DTV setup but even that doesn't get me everything I had (aside from the Voom 21). VavaVoom was a steal. Including OTA I had 50+ HD channels at my fingertips!

I stayed up and watched them go off the air.

Remember this:

Watching HD News as it goes Dark

 

[fksammons]

What good is an HD DVR if you don't have the programming for it? You may have an HD DVR with Dish or DirecTV, but you don't have the massive choices of HD programming like Voom offered. Programming versus DVR?? I go with programming. Who cares if I can record it in HD. I just want to watch something in HD period.

What good is tons of HD programming if you can't record it and watch it on your schedule.? Reason #1 VOOM failed like it or not.

 

[riffjim4069]

VOOM HD Networks to expand the channel lineup as well as total programming offering

I too have been unhappy with VOOM programming the past few months, but just hang on a little bit longer....it's going to get a lot better. It is my understanding that VOOM had been vaulting much of their content for when they roll-out their expanded lineup and market VOOM HD Networks post FCC approval of the sale of Rainbow-1 and other Rainbow DBS assets. FYI, approval was just granted on 12 October. Anyway, here is part of an e-mail reply I received last week from a GM at VOOM Networks. Take it as you wish:

Mr. Dolan has forwarded your email to me and I am sorry to hear of your displeasure. We appreciate your interest and support.

We have been working with our new distribution partner, Echostar, to transition VOOM to Dish Network's infrastructure. Within the next few months we will be expanding the channel lineup as well as the total program offering. You can expect the expanded offering by the beginning of the new year; our goal is for you to find it even better in quantity and quality than what you first experienced.

Thanks very much for your comments, Mr. riffjim4069. We are working to better meet your needs in the near future and look forward to hearing from your again.

 

[Jamey K]

Amen. We really had it great.

Roger that. I came across my VOOM stb this weekend and felt a hard wave of emptyness.

Damn, I wish VOOM was still here. And not new Voom, We're talking Classic VOOM.

 

[riffjim4069]

The new VOOM and Classic VOOM? If you're talking about the VOOM HD Pak, I think it will eventually be just as good if not better than before. If you're a fan of the VOOM HD Network channels (I am a fan of Cinema10), then this should be welcomed news. By Classic VOOM, I will assume you are talking about the tremendous value of VOOM DBS providing the East/West Coast feeds of HBO/Max/Sho/Starz/Encore and all the other HD channels. In that respect, yes...I miss VOOM very much!

Verizon FiOS is showing promise, and if E* can bring us all VOOM21, ESPN2-HD, Starz-HD, Max-HD, UHD, Wealth-TV and perhaps the INHDs, then I'll be quite happy.

 

[optimusprime]

Verizon FiOS is showing promise...

True, but then there are people who live in areas where ALL buried cables belong to a Baby Bell, a massive cable company, (Time Warner for me...) or the power company.

I won't see FiOS for years. Why? Because it would cost Verizon tens of billions to lay their own lines to compete head on with TWC and BellSouth, just in the state of North Carolina.

I'll just stay on here and read about it

 

[riffjim4069]

True, but then there are people who live in areas where ALL buried cables belong to a Baby Bell, a massive cable company, (Time Warner for me...) or the power company.

I won't see FiOS for years. Why? Because it would cost Verizon tens of billions to lay their own lines to compete head on with TWC and BellSouth, just in the state of North Carolina.

I'll just stay on here and read about it

Absolutely, there will still be plenty of room for Cable and DBS providers.

 

[mkwillia]

I miss Voom as well. I still can't get used to not having mostly every HD channel that was offed at that time. I am still trying to replace that HD void. Comcast is ok but it fall short.



PS - what cities are going to get FIOS? I hope Atlanta gets it soon.

 

[negreenfield]

I miss Voom as well. I still can't get used to not having mostly every HD channel that was offed at that time. I am still trying to replace that HD void. Comcast is ok but it fall short.



PS - what cities are going to get FIOS? I hope Atlanta gets it soon.

not if I have anything to do with it

I work for Cox cable, cable has some good stuff coming down the pipe I just hope we can move faster than we traditionally do...

I'm in an Adelphia area (just moved from Comcast area) so I'm using Dish for now, had Voom for the HD that Comcast greatly lacked at one time (though it's gotten much much better) and now have Dish because Adelphia has a terrible HD offering.